Gods Dogs, Book 3

Don’t bite the hand that feeds you, ’cause most likely the hand that feeds you don’t need you.

Unknown

Anjevin Ronal Est, Emperor of the Chert Empire, could see the societal erosion. It was compounded by the fact that the empire lacked any coherent goal. Waging war was off the table, but that was what they knew, how they organized their society, and what the economy was geared to produce.

The supreme council of elders was in deadlock. Half of them were ready to start systemic changes. The other half was intent on punishing rebels, the shadow government, the Coyotes, or just about anyone they were currently mad at.

They alternated, though, between anger at enemies (actual or perceived), and awarding government contracts to their cronies. Anjevin assumed that was a hedge against it all falling apart. Rich families could escape, if they were rich enough, and start over somewhere.

Anjevin was in his office overlooking a harbor. The sea was whipping the cliffs with greater than normal fury. He saw it as a metaphor for his mood.

The latest statement from the Chert shadow government detailed the corruption, bribery, and favoritism in the current budget. It didn’t name the corruption directly, but did so by highlighting alternative fiscal solutions.

Those solutions, fully researched and documented in Congress worlds as workable, showed a savings to the empire in the trillions of credits. The report was causing a stir in the Chert population, and the supreme council wanted him to put a stop to it. It would be easier to stop an avalanche.

His chief-of-staff returned from an errand and said, “Lornalie Duval is a refugee. We are almost certain she is on Upana, the world where the shadow government is located.”

“That doesn’t surprise me,” Anjevin said as he sat. “I do need a reporter I can trust. We need to break the impasse in the council. If we can turn the budget fiasco into a scandal, maybe a few of the elders will retire.”

The chief nodded but cautioned, “Or they could get more desperate.”

“There is that,” Anjevin grumped. “How many assassins do they control?”

“Not more than two battalions. The entire Special Forces are down in numbers. With no war to fight, the smart ones are getting out of the military.”

“Especially so, because they are no match for the Congress Special Forces.”

“That battle has our strategists still shaking their heads.”

“Yes,” Anjevin said heavily. “I reviewed the footage over a long weekend. They were creative, brutal, and possessed a will to win that we’ve never had. It was terrifying.”

“And you’ll do anything from fighting them again.”

“Yes. We have all we need. We just need to learn how to manage it.”

“And a scandal will help push out the people who stand in the way of that.”

“I hope so,” Anjevin said.

The chief pulled his blaster. “Then I need to place you under arrest.”

Anjevin sat stunned for a moment before he started laughing. Guards entered and escorted him to a shuttle. The shuttle took him to a mountain top fortress an hour’s flight from the capitol.

It was an old fortress, long retired from service, but now refurbished to be Anjevin’s prison for life.

The news of Anjevin’s arrest came with the next dispatches. Lornalie told Quinn, “He was against the attack on the Milky Way. He probably supports the peace process.”

Quinn saw where she was going. “You want us to rescue him and bring him here.”

She grinned, lower canines showing. “He is a strategic asset.”

Quinn smiled back. “I’ll ask.”

He sent the request to Satya, and it was relayed by ansible to Master Chin. He approved the op and sent a relief Coyote team to replace Quinn’s.

Jolene’s team showed up aboard their cutter, Artemis. A shuttle brought them to the planet. The reunion was intense but brief. Eli, Sunny, and Rob were happy for the break this new assignment offered.

Long Bow approached from the tree line, and Pax waved him over.

“Long Bow,” he called out, “this is our replacement team.”

The native dipped his head in a shallow bow. “I will miss you, Pax, but these humans carry a similar energy as your team. I think the tribe will like them.”

Eli, the empath for Jolene’s team, replied, “And your energy is a welcome in itself, Long Bow. Thank you for welcoming us.”

Long Bow smiled and sauntered off.

Eli observed, “Can they even leave this planet, Pax?”

“I don’t know. They are bonded to it in a way I haven’t seen before.”

River said, “I don’t think they have any interest in leaving anyway.”

The briefing took a couple of days. During that time, River and Jolene got together for a lengthy visit. They were in the same candidate class and their friendship was long and deep. When they ran into each other now, they just took up where they left off.

They were strolling along the bank of the river on a path that ran parallel to it. The sun was high but not giving off much heat. Winter was beginning. Darkening clouds were on the horizon, and change was in the air.

“So you’re off to Andromeda to rescue the Chert emperor,” Jolene stated, her mobile Polynesian face showing both humor and concern.

“Yeah. For a Chert male, he’s pretty thoughtful and seems to care about all the people in his empire. Not sure how him being here will change the balance of power.”

“You’re thinking more strategically these days.”

River laughed. “You still think I should run a team, don’t you?”

“You would be good at it, but no. I’ve revised my opinion on that.”

“Really?”

“Running a team requires a detachment your empathic qualities wouldn’t allow. You might not be a trained, designated empath like Eli or Pax, but you’re in their league. Penglai policy is empaths don’t run teams. I think it’s a good policy.”

“And you have the detachment.”

“I do. It’s kind of weird to shift to that place and think of my guys as assets. It’s a different kind of cold-bloodedness.”

“Different from combat cold-bloodedness?”

“Yeah. It’s similar but different. I found, during the battle at galaxies edge, that I was using my guys without a thought to whether or not they survived. It messed me up for a while.”

“But you got through it.”

“Rand helped with it. He told me the admiral knew we wouldn’t survive.”

“When we were using those command ships to take over other command ships.”

“You guys had one, we had one – thanks to you, and we were playing merry hell behind their lines. The admiral gave us zero chance of surviving and wanted both our teams awarded for suicidal bravery.”

“I didn’t know that.”

“Rand only told me about it to help me see the demands leaders live with. If I couldn’t live with those demands, I needed to step down.”

“Well, you didn’t. How did you resolve it?”

Jolene smiled. “I meditated on it for a couple of days. I realized we won that battle, your team and mine, but only because the admiral was willing to sacrifice us. I got that with an intense kind of clarity. Protecting those we do means leaders must sometimes make those kinds of choices. I can make those choices.”

River put an arm around her friend’s shoulders. “That’s a heavy-duty insight into who you are, Jolene. If it’s any help, I’d follow your lead, anywhere, any time.”

Jolene chuckled and put her arm around River’s waist. “That’s no help at all. You followed my lead since we were candidates, and look what trouble we got into then.”

Sneaking into Andromeda was the first problem. They solved that by contracting with a Sangalore trader. The second problem was to effect the rescue without being identified. It had to be anonymous for the obvious political reasons.

Aboard Satya, once they were on a ballistic course through the solar system to the Chert homeworld, the team studied the layout of the fortress and considered how to pull it off.

The ancient fortress was on a high point in rolling hill country. On the west side was a sheer drop to the ocean. On the south side was another sheer drop to ragged, rocky hills. On the north side was a U-shaped valley that was deeply cut to the fortress wall. On the east, there was a break in the ridgeline that marched to the sea. It gave the fortress another sheer drop at the break but not as deep as on the other sides. On the U-shaped valley side, there was a landing pad for shuttles that fronted large rollup doors at the middle of the rectangular footprint of the fortress.

It was wider at the west and east ends, and narrow in the middle – like a square dumbbell. The entire structure was based on a three-floor design. In the middle, narrow section, though, two more floors sat atop the three below. These taller structures sat back from the north side, and balconies overlooked the drop on the south side.

Anjevin with his guards and support staff occupied these middle buildings. Both ends, then, of the fortress were shut down and unoccupied.

Getting in and out wasn’t going to be a problem. The concentration of staff and guards was the problem. Added to that, there were certainly modern surveillance devices to monitor inside and out.

“It looks like we need a better read on what’s going on inside,” Moss said.

They were in the training room, the holo-image of the fortress hovering before them.

Pax asked, “Can we get mosquitoes in there?”

River answered, “Depends on how sophisticated the resident A.I. is.”

Quinn said, “We need to go in there. I’m thinking we come in from the closed-down ends and meet in the middle.”

“That will give me a chance to figure out the A.I. situation,” River said. “If it’s dumb enough, I could take it over and we can use the existing surveillance network.”

Moss commented, “The Chert aren’t all that big on A.I.s.”

“True,” Quinn replied, “but what if this is a trap, and they upgraded hoping we underestimate the A.I.?”

“There’s that,” Moss allowed. “Maybe we also need to locate their ready force.”

Pax pointed out, “The fortress is close enough to the city, it could just be one of the bases there.”

“That’s likely,” River said. “Unless they get real cute and have one stashed in the closed off buildings.”

Quinn thought about it and said, “That’s not likely, but some resident assassins are likely.”

“So, a second layer of sensors and booby-traps run by a second A.I.,” River surmised.

Quinn nodded. “And some way to alert them if you tried to take over the first one.”

“If they are that paranoid,” Moss said, “then they’ll have satellite coverage as well.”

“Yep,” Quinn agreed. “So… we need to come in the front door during a supply delivery.”

“And what?” Moss asked. “Hang out until we get a good read on what we’re facing?”

“As much as that will suck,” Quinn replied, “I think it’s the safest approach.”

“Two or three days in a suit will suck,” River agreed.

“Could be longer,” Moss commented with a grin.

“It could be,” Quinn said with a sigh. “Okay. It looks like the U-shaped valley is where they land shuttles. We get there, sneak up to the entrance, and wait for them to open it for resupply.”

With the plan to get inside outlined, they had Satya monitor activity for the next two weeks. Satya positioned herself between high and low orbit, outside the traffic lanes, and used maneuvering jets to hold position over the fortress. It was a tricky bit of flying, and the crew was happy to see the team deploy in their drop pods.

The pods landed a ridgeline over from the fortress in a barren, rocky landscape. The drop pods reconfigured themselves to resemble the boulders nearby, and the team began its trek to get to their first waypoint before dawn.

They dug shallow scout pits near the supply entrances and waited the half-day until the scheduled weekly supply shuttle showed up. Two massive doors opened and grav-trucks rolled out to be loaded.

The team inched into position and attached to the sides of the trucks, their camo helping them blend to the surfaces they attached to.

One at a time, over the hour it took for the trucks to load, unload, reload, and receive all the supplies, each of them slipped into the fortress. Now they were in the receiving dock. The fortress workers then transported the supplies to their intended departments – kitchen, housekeeping, maintenance, etc.

Each of them found their way to a different area. When the workday was over, they began their exploration.

River found a computer node and plugged in. She and Becky carefully tracked how the system was organized, and especially if there was a secondary system connected to the main NSAI. It was a slow, meticulous process.

It was after midnight when they found the second system, a cleverly designed tripwire connected to the NSAI’s maintenance program.

[Aha,] River exclaimed. [They figured I’d put the NSAI into maintenance mode when I took it over.]

[Looks that way,] Becky agreed. [If we take it over at the admin level, they will be none the wiser.]

[Do we have admin tokens?]

[Not yet, but I will have them the next time someone logs in.]

[My, aren’t you the clever one. I suppose you can give us our own identity and our own tokens, log out of the poor dupe’s account, and we’re in business.]

[You suppose correctly.]

[Well, I’m going to get some sleep. Let me know when you need me.]

River eased into an overhead space between ducts and the stone walls. She was soon fast asleep.

The others had released the small drones called mosquitoes by letting them attach to the workers. After a few hours, they were rewarded with a detailed map of the lower three floors, but not the upper ones.

In the morning, though, when servers brought Anjevin his breakfast, the drones recorded the route and mapped the spaces of the upper floors.

By that evening, they knew the entire layout, including where everybody congregated or worked. That included the three-man assassin team, the twenty guards, and the sensor and communication techs. The support staff of about forty stayed mostly on the lower two floors.

The guards worked a four-hour shift each day. Two were with Anjevin, while the other two walked a roving patrol. The assassins performed random sweeps of all the floors and checked their independent sensor grid randomly as well.

During the night of their second day in the fortress, River let them know, “I’ve got control of both computer networks and both NSAIs. Neither was very smart, but how they were networked together was pretty ingenious. We’re good to go. Your A.I.s have tokens that the NSAIs will know to erase you from the network. You’re invisible.”

“Like they won’t see us?” Moss asked.

“Correct.”

Quinn said, “Good work. Where are the assassins now?”

“In their rooms.”

“Okay, we need to neutralize them. Pax, you’re the closest. What about the roving guards?”

“They are getting a snack in the kitchen,” River sent. “I’m closest to them.”

“Good. Moss and I will deal with the other guards and nab Anjevin. If we get separated, RV Hotel.”

There were three answering clicks, and the operation began. Pax eased open the door to the assassins’ room. It was an old-style door on hinges and a latch that lifted from a keeper. It didn’t squeak, but the one assassin that was still up turned at the movement of the door opening. Pax shot him with a nearly silent needler burst. Then he stunned the others who were sleeping.

River shot the guards with needler bursts, pulled their bodies into a storage closet, and headed for the stairs.

Moss and Quinn came through separate doors on either side of the space Anjevin was allotted. Both guards were playing a card game at a table near the center of the space next to a balcony. Moss shot one; Quinn, the other.

Anjevin was in an adjoining bedroom. They entered, and Quinn woke him up, while Moss stood guard.

“Anjevin,” Quinn barked as he shook the emperor. “Wake up. We’re getting you out of here.”

Anjevin bolted to a sitting position and looked around. Then his eyes focused and he said, “They know you’re coming. This is a trap.”

Quinn chuckled. “Yeah. We figured. Let’s go.”

Anjevin rolled out of bed and Quinn tossed him a skin suit. “Wear this. We had it made just for you.”

River and Pax entered through separate doors and headed for the balcony. There, River sent off a tight beam to Satya.

As Anjevin pulled on the skin suit, the team outfitted the light armor with glide wings they pulled from the suit’s storage compartments. The wings were triangular sheets that connected from the hands to the feet, and along the body. They also rigged Anjevin with a harness so they could suspend him between them.

“Let’s go,” Quinn said, and they lined up on the balcony rail. “One, two, three, jump.”

It was over 3,000 feet to the bottom of the cliff, and the wind was minimal. The diurnal flows were spent as it was after midnight. They were able to glide around the promontory of the ridge and head north along the seacoast for almost five miles. They landed on a rocky beach. It was low tide, and they landed below the high water mark, hoping the coming tide would erase their trail before the search began.

They removed the wings and stored them. Then the race further north began. They stayed nearer the water where the sand was firmer and held to a steady jog that Anjevin could keep up with.

After an hour, River said, “The alarm just went out.”

Anjevin asked, “How do you know?”

River snorted. “The NSAIs and I are good friends. They told me.”

“We won’t make it to the pick up point,” Quinn determined. “Let Satya know we’re going to ground.”

River nodded and an antenna deployed out of the shoulder of her armor. After a moment, she said, “Sent.”

“The pods?” Moss asked.

“Yeah,” Quinn answered. “In that ravine just ahead.”

They sent commands to their pods. Using their maneuvering jets, the pods made their way to the team. They positioned each in a shallow trench. Quinn put Anjevin in his pod, and once everybody was situated, he further camouflaged the pods with shrubbery and loose dirt. Then he built a hide along the top of the ravine and climbed in.

For the next three days, an intensive search scoured the area around the fortress. Twice search parties wandered through the ravine. Overhead, hovercraft flew grid searches. At sea, boats ran their own search patterns.

River kept them entertained with reports from the fortress’ NSAIs, and she let them know when it was safe to get out of the pods to eat, take care of nature’s calls, and refresh their suits.

On the fourth day, the search was called off. That night, they resumed their trek to the extraction point. It was an overhang rock that was submerged at high tide, but at low tide it provided a five-foot high space to hide under.

The shuttle approached from the ocean, turned stern to them, and dropped its ramp. The ramp was mostly under the overhang, and therefore hard to see from overhead, and the group scrambled onboard.

The shuttle submerged, traveled a few hours out to sea, surfaced and used its maneuvering jets to gain speed and elevation. When it was near a town, it fired its main engine, squawked free trader codes, and headed for orbit.

They rendezvoused with the free trader whose codes they used. Anjevin got off there. The free trader did piece-work for the resistance and was on its return leg to the Milky Way.

As he exited the shuttle, Anjevin said to them, “I’m not sure whether or not to thank you.”

Moss interrupted what looked like a lengthy statement, “You’re basically a good guy, Anjevin, and you care about your people. Go do something that will help them.”

Anjevin nodded his shaggy head. “I will. What will you be doing?”

Moss grinned. “We’ve got a promise to keep.”

“A promise?”

“Yeah. Pax promised Elder Patonon Sembol a visit.”

Anjevin laughed and disembarked to be greeted by the captain of the free trader.